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Sunday, December 30, 2018

2018 Books in Review

This year, I set out to read 17 types of books, the main
goal being quality over quantity. As far as numbers go, I read 100. As for how
many of those books actually met my reading goal, you’ll just have to read and
find out!

Don’t worry, I’m not going to be talking about books I
didn’t enjoy unless they happened to be a part of my goal. Books that earned a
five-star rating are marked.

1) At least one
poetry collection. (Not a novel in verse.)

A Boy’s Will, North of Boston, and Mountain Interval by Robert Frost.

Turns out I like selected poems from Robert Frost. There’s
maybe one or two of the poems in these books that I remember aside from the
famous “The Road Not Taken.” I prefer “Stopping By the Woods on a Snowy
Evening” from his New Hampshire collection,
but I didn’t make it that far in the complete works.

2) Two rereads.

Yes, I own several books with movie covers, and yes, I like
them. Judge me.

I think I like rereading books! Maybe I can calm down now?
What is this “calm” I write of?

3) Three nonfiction
books.

Brown Girl Dreaming
by Jacqueline Woodson, A Philosophy of
Walking by Frédéric Gros, The Soul of
an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration Into the Wonder of Consciousness by Sy
Montgomery, Walking Home: A Poet’s
Journey by Simon Armitage, The House
at Sugar Beach by Helene Cooper (5/5 stars), and the Bad*** Librarians of Timbuktu by Joshua Hammer.

Since when do I enjoy philosophy books? 2018 apparently.

Also, I have very eclectic taste in nonfiction. I thought
I’d read more serious stuff (like astronomy and art) and ended up reading about
octopuses. Yep, it’s octopuses not octopi.

The House on Sugar
Beach, A Philosophy of Walking,
and The Bad*** Librarians are pretty
serious though.

4) Four classics.

The Old Man and the
Sea by Ernest Hemingway (American classic), Kindred by Octavia A. Butler (sci-fi classic; totally counts), The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling
(children’s classic), Every Man Dies
Alone by Hans Fallada (German classic), and Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs (American classic).

There I go with the sea creatures again! The Old Man and the Sea explores the
joys and trials of fishing, and The
Jungle Book even features a story about a sea lion.

5) Five
indie-published books.

The Beast of Talesend,
The Tomb of the Sea Witch, and The Stroke of Eleven by Kyle Robert
Shultz; Colors of Fear and Flames of Courage by Hannah Heath; Embassy by S. Alex Martin; The Crystal Tree by Imogen Elvis; and The Lake of Living Water: A The Firstborn’s
LegacyShort Story by Beth
Wrangler; Antiheroes by by Kyle
Robert Shultz, E.V. Dawson, Hannah Heath, Beth Wangler, Nate Philbrick, J.E.
Purrazzi, and K.L. + Pierce; and Masters
and Beginners by Daley Downing.

I didn’t mean to pick such short books: the shortest being 19
pages, the longest 356. It just sorta happened. I also think it’s a trend for
the indie authors whom I follow to write compact books and short stories.
*shrugs*

6) One book published
before 1800.

Paradise Regained
by John Milton.

Yes, only one. I started it near the end of November, so can
you blame me? Having read and wrote on its predecessor, Paradise Lost, for my dissertation, I thought it appropriate to
finally pick up this one. Though I wasn’t as drawn to the story as I was in Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained certainly has some excellent principles.

7) One book over
1,000 pages long.

Soooo… I didn’t quite make this one.

Perhaps the longest book I read was Obsidio at 615 pages. The book that felt the longest was probably The Final Empire at 541 pages, and those
pages were long. I know neither are thousand-page
books, but I did read a total of 29,400 pages this year. In 2019, I’ll start my
bigger goals a little earlier, like I did in 2017 with Moby-Dick (Jan. 1 through Aug. 24) and Les Miserables (Oct. 6 through Dec. 12).

Considering how many of my challenges I actually met, I’m
pretty proud of myself. Next year maybe I’ll fully meet each goal.

Bonus: Novels in
Verse

Audacity by Melanie
Crowder, Blood Water Paint by Joy
McCullough, Somewhere Among by Annie
Donwerth-Chikamatsu.

I read my first novel in verse back in 2016, and I’ve been
hooked ever since. This one wasn’t an initial goal, but I wrote a whole post on
why I like this type of poetry, and I eventually want to write a novel
in verse. So I had to read more of them!

The Astonishing Color
of After by Emily X. R. Pan (see book review; want to buy)

The Art of Feeling
by Laura Tims

The Final Empire
by Brandon Sanderson

Beren and Lúthien
by J. R. R. Tolkien (bought it)

Looks like I read 16 out of 17 target books. Maybe next year
I’ll challenge myself to read more books I actually own. Seriously, not
checking out books from the library and forcing myself to read books on my own
shelves was hard. Rewarding, but hard all the same.

Let’s chat! What kind of books did you read in 2018? Do we
share any books read? What are your reading goals for 2019?

6 comments:

Congrats on finishing all those goals! Getting all but one is pretty impressive.

I've been on a huge poetry kick this year, especially in the last few weeks. I prefer less traditional poetry than you do, I think; my favorite collections I read were Phantoms as Euphemisms for Disaster by N.L. Shompole and This Way to the Sugar by Hieu Minh Nguyen. I've also been reading a lot more indie this year! My favorite was probably The Reluctant Godfather by Allison Tebo. If you haven't read it yet, I really think you'd like it.

Oh that is so cool that you made specific reading goals to tick off! I love that idea! And congrats on getting through them so awesomely (I would fail at the 1000 pages for sure 😂I avoid super long books ahhhh oops😂) And YES for rereads! I'm so addicted to them now and I'm onto my 3rd reread of the year already lmao. My TBR hates me, yes for sure. *whistles innocently*